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“And Dash owes me one,” Elizabeth drawled. “Maybe I can help take his mind off the fact that his little girl is growing up.”
Dash glowered helplessly back at her. He had the look of a man fighting that realization to its last breath.
“You know, dancing with you could be dangerous,” Seth told Dawn as he led her onto the ballroom floor and took her in his arms.
“Really?” She questioned him lightly. “Is that bow tempting you?”
He breathed out heavily as they began to move around the floor.
“I want to see you in nothing but the damned bow,” he growled. “It’s driving me crazy.”
Dawn felt a surge of heat rise inside her at the sound of his voice, the scent of his need. It hadn’t changed; every time was just as intense, just as searing, as the one before it.
As his arms tightened around her, moving her against him, Dawn pressed her head against his chest and tried to assure herself that everything would be fine. It was going to work out, she promised herself. They would find the assassin and Seth would be okay.
“You’re worrying too much.” He kissed the top of her head, the hand that pressed against her back holding her closer as they circled the dance floor. “Everything’s going to be fine, Dawn.”
“Of course it is.” She lifted her head and smiled, but inside she felt as though she were walking a tightrope.
“Come here. Let me hold you closer.” The deep murmur of his voice sent a shiver racing down her back. “You’re trembling, sweetheart. Are you cold?”
“Considering I’m barely wearing clothes?” She smiled at that. “I have a serious draft where there’s usually no draft, Seth.”
The heat intensified as a muttered groan left his throat. “You’re trying to kill me.”
The feel of his erection against her lower stomach, the scent of his need and the strength of his arms around her assured her Seth had little thought for anything but that draft and that bow beneath her dress.
“There’s a serious arising where there’s usually no arising in public too,” he growled, causing a hint of laughter to escape her.
She laughed with Seth. She could go years without laughing at Sanctuary. There had always seemed to be a veil between her and happiness. It always seemed to hover around her, but never touch her, until now.
Something inside her seemed freer, less contained, but she was terribly afraid that the loosening of emotion inside her was also the reason the memories were returning. Why the panic was building inside her.
She could still feel that amplified sense of being watched, being touched by evil. Her shoulders were tight with it, her skin crawled with it.
She looked out over the dance floor again, trying to make sense of it. They were far enough from the open doors that they couldn’t be seen—that couldn’t be it. No one appeared to be watching, except Jason Phelps. He looked as inebriated as ever, a smile on his face.
He looked like a weasel. And she didn’t like weasels.
Seth could feel the tension slowly building in the woman he held, and it made him want to hold her tighter. Because he knew. He had known what was coming the first time he took her to his bed.
She had held the memories back because she had never let go of that amazing control enough to give them a chance to slip free. There was no control in the passion they shared though. Not for him, and not for her.
It was like wildfire.
That, added to the stress of the mission she was involved in and the assassin no doubt still lying in wait, was too much for her.
He hadn’t just walked out of her life ten years before. He had consulted the best psychologists and psychiatrists in the world and discussed the situation. He’d needed to know what he was facing if he ignored Callan’s and Jonas’s request that he walk away from her.
He had stayed away because those professionals had warned him that under the right circumstances, those memories would definitely return.
As he held her close, their bodies swaying to the music, the heat of arousal, tenderness and some undefined something that had existed since their first touch wrapped around them.
He let his fingers press against her lower back, hoping to ease some of the tension. He pressed his lips to her shoulder and felt that little purr he loved so well.
He almost grinned as he thought of the smile Dawn had given Lillian Bartel. Whatever the other woman had said to her might not have set well
with her, but she knew how to be a lady.
